Lelouch's Knots
by SylverEyes
Summary: Oneshot::She wasn't natural, he wasn't normal, and now they're forced to work together. Lelouch was the person in between who kept them together, like glue. "What are you to Lelouch?"::Rated for implied adult scenes::Request from Val-Creative::SPOILERS


Uh oh! It's my first venture into the Code Geass fandom, and I'm a bit nervous because I'm not sure how good of a grasp I have on these characters. But I did have a lot of fun writing this, and it's one of my favorite ships in this fandom, so I'm pretty excited too! :D This was a request from my good friend _Val-Creative, _who introduced me to this awesome show, and is my buddy in the crack!ships of all fandoms that we share. I know that I'll never be alone in my ships! -strikes heroic pose and falls down the stairs- Enjoy, Val!

**Before you go any further, let me warn you that there are major spoilers for the entire series in here, especially the last few episodes.**

**Disclaimer: **If I owned Code Geass, there would be a lot more "mildly flirtatious banter" flying in all directions. :D

-------

They were nowhere.

No, that wasn't right. He simply did not actually know _where _they were. It was glowing, golden. He would go so far as to say that it was beautiful. But there was an unearthly chill about the golden and glowing place, something that sent involuntary shivers snaking down his spine.

They were sitting there talking. Not standing, not pacing, but sitting. Comfortably. Casually. He ground his teeth together. It felt too right, so much so that there was a harsh chord of wrongness vibrating through his being. Something that he needed was missing, but that something was never supposed to be here…

The golden-eyed girl belonged here. Her eyes, they matched it. The glowing, the chill, the… wrongness. Who was she? What was she? He knew her, but he didn't know her. This place was disorienting. It was too quiet for them, too calm and peaceful for a place where Marianne and Charles had just disintegrated into thin air.

With a violent movement, Suzaku clutched his head in his hands, shutting his eyes tightly. This place wasn't supposed to exist, or he wasn't supposed to be here… either of the two would suffice…

"Suzaku?" Asked a cool voice, washing over him. The boy looked up to see Lelouch… his best friend and his worst enemy. He was conversing with him easily, sitting with a slight slouch as they discussed the matters that they deemed important. Plans, plans were being made…

_For you, Shirley…?_

There was a rustle of fabric to his right, and the golden-eyed witch glided over to him. Without his consent, she took his face into her hands and stared into his eyes. With a freezing cold thumb and forefinger, she opened one of them wide and he found that he did not have the strength to resist her, even though on the inside his pride was screaming for him to kick her off.

"This place is not good for him…" she said in that silvery tone of hers. So different than any of the other women he had ever heard speak. When she was quiet like this, it almost sounded like her voice was swirling breath on ice, or silk whispering over steel. "It is not good for you either, Lelouch."

"Who are you talking to?" He asked her, and Suzaku could see his friend's soft smile. It wasn't fair that he should be able to smile. He should not be allowed to smile after everything that he had done. Everyone he had made suffer, everyone he had killed… Nunally… Euphie…

"_I will die for Euphie, Suzaku." Was he telling the truth? "I will die for Euphie. I promise."_

They had had a battle of words. It had been the first time that they had told the truth, the whole truth, to each other in a long time. The witch had stayed silent throughout, watching as they screamed. He had wanted to drive his blade through Lelouch's heart; he had been willing himself to do it the entire time.

It seemed that they were far more alike than he liked to think.

Learning the truth about Euphie's death served to calm him down and enrage him further at the same time. She hadn't deserved to go out like that. Under the effects of the Geass, but accidentally as well? No, no! Suzaku had been forced to admit that it must have torn Lelouch's heart in two, from the way he described it. She had been his sister and he had been willing to work with her.

It was the Geass; it all came back to the Geass. To _her_.

The witch stood up straight and moved away from him, and Suzaku found that he could breathe again. She turned her chilled golden eyes onto Lelouch and commented, "Let's leave this place. We can finish preparations when we are back somewhere that will not make you two sick."

She should stay. She belonged here, and she should never leave and inflict the Geass upon anyone else. Suzaku's green eyes darkened and he stared at the ground where he sat. He had been part of an operation to catch her, and now he couldn't say her name, not even in his head…

A hand appeared in his field of vision, and Suzaku glanced up at Lelouch, who was offering to help him to his feet. "What do you say?" He asked, his normally violet eyes full and tainted by his Geass. "Will you help me?"

The golden-eyed witch watched from the background.

He took Lelouch's hand.

-------

"What are you to Lelouch?"

C.C. looked up from where she sat, curled up with Cheese-kun, leaning against the wall. Her gaze found Suzaku sitting opposite her with his brown locks hanging over his eyes, obscuring them from his vision. She frowned slightly before speaking. "Who are _you _to Lelouch?"

"Answer my question!" He snapped, and the green-haired witch noticed that there was a note of panic in his voice.

There was a pause where only the shallow breaths of Zero's Knight could be heard. C.C.'s expression hardened ever so slightly. "What must be done must be done. Even if it means getting rid of Nunally."

Suzaku stood up suddenly, towering over her. Fury radiated from his every pore. "Don't preach to me, witch. I helped come up with this plan too." And then, all of a sudden, the energy was sucked out of him and he slid back down the wall. "Where is Lelouch?"

C.C. gave him an odd look. He knew where Lelouch was. "He's barricaded himself inside because he needs to deal with this knowledge that Nunally is-"

"I know!" The roar came and a clenched fist slammed into the hard floor. "And he will only let the two of us in. Why? What are you to Lelouch?"

C.C. was silent. What was she supposed to say? They were both simply helping Lelouch achieve his goals in every way that they needed to, because none of them had lost their goals of a peaceful world, not matter how different their means had been to get it at first.

"Nunally is his little sister. Shirley is his love-"

"Shirley is dead."

"_I know!_ Along with Euphie and Rolo and so many others! But not you? Why not you?"

"Why not you?"

"Tch," Suzaku turned away from her in disdain. "You are avoiding my question."

"You are acting like a child. We all knew what we were going to have to do coming into this. You are his sword, are you not? Be Zero's Knight." C.C. held Cheese-kun tighter and bit her lip. It was all easier said than done, and they both knew it. But they had never been promised that it would be easy.

"Why are we letting him do this?" Asked Suzaku quietly, staring with an unfocused gaze at the door behind which Lelouch was. A moment of weakness, of doubt. Something that he, as a knight, would never normally show. If he had been Lelouch, C.C. would move over to him and hold him. But he was not, so she did not.

"Because it is what he wants." Their eyes met for a moment and they both stilled. "Because we are his accomplices."

-------

"Are you afraid of dying?" He asked her one night, one of those nights where they were both up late and in the kitchen because they couldn't bring themselves to lay their heads down and sleep.

"Feeling philosophical tonight, are we?" She countered him, not even bothering to open her eyes from where she was slumped over the table. She was so, so tired. But sleep was not allowed.

"I'm serious."

C.C. sighed deeply and shifted her head on her arms, letting her hair fall over her face. "No." She answered him. It was too late to keep up any sort of witty banter, or to dance around his landmines. He would get some straight answers this time.

"No, you're not afraid of dying?"

"No, I'm not afraid of dying."

That she answered must have thrown him off balance because he said nothing for a long while, long enough that C.C. cracked open one eye to check that he hadn't fallen asleep in the sink.

"That means that none of us are afraid of dying." Suzaku really was in a deep mood. Maybe she would stop coming into the kitchen at night.

"None of us who?"

"Us three."

"Mmm…" She agreed sleepily.

"No…" And now he seemed to be talking to himself. "I welcome death. Dying."

C.C. pulled herself upright when she heard that and fixed him with her unnerving golden stare. "That makes two of us." She told him, feeling as though her face was trying to frown when it really wanted to smile.

He didn't seem shocked. But then, nothing surprised him anymore. "Maybe three?"

They both turned to look at the door to the hallway where there was the marble staircase and eventually through more hallways and doors, Lelouch's room. It was doubtful that he was sleeping; he hardly did anymore.

The witch's face was collectively expressionless. "Maybe three."

-------

It was the dead of night. Prisoners were secured, Geassed servants were all keeping guard and Lelouch had once again disappeared into his own room. But this time he was not plotting or planning. There was no more of that to do. He had quietly bid the two of them goodbye (separately, personally) before retreating there to come to terms with what was going to happen tomorrow. Everyone knew what they had to do. Tomorrow they just had to do it.

Two bodies thumped against the bedroom wall, pressing against each other as they slid down slowly. With a gasp they broke apart, trying to catch their breath after the kiss. He dove straight for her jaw, planting butterfly kisses up along it, all the way to her ear where he nibbled on the lobe.

She gasped at the feeling and closed her golden eyes. "I am more than his accomplice." She whispered, panting.

Once he was finished tending to her ear he moved down to her neck, saying between his ministrations, "So… am I… although it's… more like he's… more… to me…" His hot breath washed over her skin, and goose bumps erupted.

Her delicate, slender hands slid from where she was clutching at his shoulders to his chest, feeling out the muscles there through his clothes. Her fingers lingered over his stomach, memorizing every detail that she could through the material, causing him to groan quietly into her skin. "I've ki-kissed him before," her golden eyes closed as he gave her one more quick kiss on the lips before fumbling fingers tried to undo her clasps.

"I never have," He informed her, intent on letting more of her skin free. "I've thought about it, though." The clasps at her shoulders came undone, and he pulled the fabric away, exposing more of her creamy white skin. However, she stopped him from doing any more and pushed him backwards so that he was lying on the floor and looking up at her where she straddled him.

The girl lowered herself slowly so that her mouth was level with his ear, and her breasts pressed into his chest, her breath tickling his brown curls. "I think he is the only person that I have ever loved this much." Her golden eyes darkened, although he could not see that. "But he is not the only one I've ever loved."

His hands moved up to her green hair as she sat up and set to work on his own clasps that would let her explore more of his tanned body. He watched her face as she worked and informed her, "He was, and is, always on my mind. Like Euphie." A pause as he ran out of his hands all the way through her long locks. "I have loved him longer." He growled in the back of his throat as she found his unconcealed chest and attacked it with her mouth.

"He is addictive." She bit him softly and Suzaku let out a hissing breath of air. "And tomorrow he is going to die."

The young man made to sit up, but she kept him on his back with a somewhat harsh push to his shoulders. He was resigned to letting her finish mapping out his torso with her fingers and her mouth, moving over him with so much ease. "I am going to be the one who-" his breath hitched and his fingers in her hair tightened as she took his nipple into her mouth. "-kills him."

At this, C.C. paused and looked up at him, her golden eyes meeting his green ones. "It is what he wants."

Suzaku took this moment of distraction to heave himself up and push her back against the wall, taking her wrists in one of his hands so she couldn't try and have him on the ground again. "I know," He answered her, moving light fingers up one of her arms to her shoulder, and then down to her breast. "And then I will become Zero."

C.C.'s breath started to come short as he massaged her breast through the material that was still covering her body, and then moaned when he breathed on her nipple. "You… you aren't ready," She told him honestly, closing her eyes tightly.

"I never will be," Was his bitter reply before they met each other in a kiss once more, tongues battling for dominance.

"I won't be there," The witch muttered into his mouth, sending pleasant vibrations thrilling through him. He broke the kiss and leaned his forehead against hers, watching her bruised lips.

"Afterwards?"

"I don't know…" She swallowed heavily. "He will be torn from us."

"He will be torn from us _by_ us." Suzaku reminded her, his grip relaxing on the various parts of her body.

"For us," C.C. added, leaning away from him and looking as though she were somewhere else.

"For everyone," The young man amended, and the witch smiled.

"I am selfish," She admitted. "With my one wish to die."

"We both are," Suzaku told her, pressing his lips to her temple gently. He moved to undo more of the clasps that hid her body from him, but C.C.'s hands stopped his.

"I have never done this before," She told him. She didn't look scared, or even apprehensive. She just seemed that she wanted to tell him of her inexperience, before they ventured any further. The knight's green eyes widened and for a moment he wanted to throw himself off of her and run away. But then her hands removed themselves from his and her expression clearly told him to continue.

He hesitated. But then, wasn't this all a part of their sharing? His fingers began to move once again and a small smile lit his face. "I have."

-------

It was all done. All of it. He was never going to be able to take off this mask in another person's presence. Not Lloyd's, not Kallen's, not even Nunally's. He was going to be alone and reduced to a symbol for as long as he lived.

After killing Lelouch, Suzaku had retreated to his hideout in the ghetto and let others deal with the aftermath. He was tired, too tired, for all of this. With great effort, the young man removed the mask, amazed at how heavy it seemed in his arms. He took a deep breath and looked up into the mirror, in the pale, flawed human face behind the perfect visage.

It took him a moment before he realized that he could see someone else in the mirror too, and spun around to be face to face with C.C. Both of their expressions were blank, because now there was no Lelouch to tie them together… she had no reason for being here. But it was far too personal already.

She was the first one to speak. "He's gone?"

Suzaku nodded stiffly. "I did it," He whispered, staring at his hands, seeing the blood that wasn't there staining them.

"The world will be happy now," She said without any real conviction. It had been their unwavering dream, all three of theirs, as they made enemies of their friends so that they could achieve it. Now, it didn't seem like it was enough. It didn't make up for it… not any of it.

"Nunally is not going to be happy." Suzaku muttered, falling into a shabby armchair and covering his face with his hands. "The student council isn't going to be happy. You're not going to be happy." He peeked at her through his fingers, and if he didn't look so defeated she would have teased him for being so innocent and cute.

"Neither are you." She said it almost like an accusation, but he accepted it. It was the truth, after all.

"One death does not cancel out the other," Suzaku murmured, and he found that it rang true. Lelouch had died for Euphie, just as he had promised, and by his best friend's hand, no less. But it brought him no satisfaction; in fact, it ripped a bigger hole into his chest.

Lelouch had kept his promise… so Suzaku would, too. He sat up straight and looked right at C.C., the determined air that he used to carry around with him all the time coming back. "I will be Zero, for him."

C.C. looked satisfied, as though that was what she had been after the entire time. "I'll order us some pizza in celebration." And she walked out of the room to use a phone. Suzaku watched her, wondering at how something could be so normal after everything. It was comforting, in a small way.

"Pizza Hut?" Came the witch's voice from another room, and Suzaku started, bringing a hand up to his face as he listened.

She was the only one whom he could ever take his mask off around.

-------

It was at the first birthday celebration of Viletta and Ougi's child that she found him. He was sitting outside and savoring the fresh air as it blew through the branches and leaves of the trees—even if he could not feel it on his face himself.

She sat gracefully besides him on the bench, somehow choosing a time, like always, when there was no one else around to see them. She wasn't around very often, but that didn't surprise him; for some reason, he had never seen her as the type that would be able to settle in one place for very long.

"Everyone is doing well," Suzaku informed her, relaxing his rigid spine against the black of the bench. "Kallen is going to school with Rivalz and Nina, and Milly drops in every once in a while, when she can. Nunally still cries a lot, but she enjoys herself the rest of the time, especially when she's with everyone. Everyone from the Black Knights was introduced to everyone from school, and Gino and Anya as well. They all get along, actually."

The breezes whispered through C.C.'s hair as she stared at the ground and listened to him speak. They had been wrong, mostly. Not about the peace, but about the people. The human race can learn to live with anything, apparently.

"On Lelouch's birthday every year, everyone from the student council celebrates together for Lelouch and Shirley. They like to remember him as he was, before… everything happened."

It was too easy to talk about this. Shouldn't they start hurting immediately when Lelouch is mentioned? Shouldn't they start crying, or feeling guilty, or regretting coming up with and agreeing to Zero Requiem? The words slipped from his tongue like butter; soft and easy.

"And you?" The witch spoke for the first time, still not looking at him. "Do they celebrate for you too?"

The words stuck in Suzaku's throat for a moment. "Yes… they do."

"I see."

There was more silence. A loud burst of laughter came from the interior of the dwelling behind them, showing the world that they were carefree and content with their lives. IT was good for them to be able to celebrate. That was what Lelouch had died for, right? To let them live in a world without war.

"I'm going to go travelling." C.C. told him, turning and facing him as she said this.

"Just… anywhere? Alone?"

"Yes," She replied, then paused with her head titled to the side, considering. "Well… not really alone."

Suzaku sighed. He was resigned to it. And yet, it did not hurt nearly as much as he would have thought. "Don't go and get yourself hurt, okay?"

C.C. smiled that soft smile that he had only ever seen her give to Lelouch. "Who are you talking to?"

"You're right." And Suzaku found himself smiling as well, feeling as though a weight had been lifted off of his shoulders. "Will you be coming back?"

"Who knows?" She gave him a sideways glance. "Do you still need me?"

The man behind the symbol of Zero said nothing. He stood when she did, and they looked at each other for a long moment. Everything else in the world melted away until it was only the two of them on the brink of something big. Slowly, he shook his head.

C.C. smiled again and squeezed his hand. The two of them had realized something with unspoken words and thoughts not expressed. "Why don't you rejoin the celebration?" She suggested, her golden eyes sparkling. "You wouldn't want to miss the cake and pizza."

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**Author's Notes:**

I hope you guys liked it! And yes, I proudly carry the banner of Suzaku/CC, although I expect to get a lot of "WTF" about the ship from readers. XD I wanted to do a sort of thing where they developed a relationship because of Lelouch, and then when he wasn't there anymore, they had to figure it out on their own. Then I wanted to do something where they both realized that they weren't alone all the time, and someone cared about them, without actually coming out and saying "They realized that they weren't alone blah blah blah".

And yes, that was my sad attempt at a physical relationship between characters. I will probably never get any raunchier than that, even though that isn't bad at all, because my writing skills falter there, and I fail epically. T_T I'm sorry.

So, I hope you guys enjoyed it, especially you, Val! I really wanted to do the characters and the pairing justice, but I'm not sure how well I pulled that off... . Oh well, please read and review! ^_^


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